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Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Thanqol

It's a great game, but I wouldn't run it A) Online (it benefits greatly from miniatures) or B) With a straight face. Rogue Trader is the brilliant ray of bright colour on the grimdark black on black of the 40K universe. The type that looks back at all that and says, "God-Emperor we're tossers".

And more than just making a simple statement, the game then encourages you to go nuts exploiting the nonsensical 40K setting for your own profit. Have you ever wanted to dogfight with 1940's-era biplanes in the reactor room of your own spaceship? Go big game hunting for Orks? Launch an orbital strike to avenge a petty grievance?

Like I told my GM, "You call them insanity points, I call them my score."

So, I've seen this before, and I still think the simple argument that avoiding fractions wherever possible beats out tau for ease of learning. 2pi is much easier to work with than tau/2 because that little bar is going to intimidate children across the world when they need to find the areas of circles.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Anarion

So, I've seen this before, and I still think the simple argument that avoiding fractions wherever possible beats out tau for ease of learning. 2pi is much easier to work with than tau/2 because that little bar is going to intimidate children across the world when they need to find the areas of circles.

1. So ... you want to confuse them a hundred times more when they get to radians and trigonometry and all the other stuff where tau really shines and makes everything so much neater? Wouldn't it be better to accept a tiny bit of possible confusion in one area to eliminate a much bigger and more pervasive confusion elsewhere?

2. Getting a good grip on division is something I'd say is important for kids at that age. If they are scared by having to halve something when they get to circles and areas, then their education has failed them massively! If we were talking about stranger fractions rather than simply halving stuff, then maybe. If squaring something is not scary, then division by 2 should not be.

If children are intimidated by simple fractions, it is not the fault of the fractions (or the children), but of their teachers, parents, educational system and/or society as a whole.

3. You could write it as 2A=tau * r^2 if you really wanted to avoid obvious fractions. Perhaps there's even an opportunity for some lesson or (possibly visual) aid to help them better understanding the formula or division itself. As a teacher I'd probably see an opportunity for some discussion here.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Deadly

1. So ... you want to confuse them a hundred times more when they get to radians and trigonometry and all the other stuff where tau really shines and makes everything so much neater? Wouldn't it be better to accept a tiny bit of possible confusion in one area to eliminate a much bigger and more pervasive confusion elsewhere?

2. Getting a good grip on division is something I'd say is important for kids at that age. If they are scared by having to halve something when they get to circles and areas, then their education has failed them massively! If we were talking about stranger fractions rather than simply halving stuff, then maybe. If squaring something is not scary, then division by 2 should not be.

If children are intimidated by simple fractions, it is not the fault of the fractions (or the children), but of their teachers, parents, educational system and/or society as a whole.

3. You could write it as 2A=tau * r^2 if you really wanted to avoid obvious fractions. Perhaps there's even an opportunity for some lesson or (possibly visual) aid to help them better understanding the formula or division itself. As a teacher I'd probably see an opportunity for some discussion here.

See, I think going the other way makes more sense. The most simple and basic formula should look completely simple and early on people should be able to grasp the stuff as easily as possible. If you avoid scaring them off, then they'll actually learn the math and then by the time they get into trig they'll be capable enough to divide by 2 as necessary.

The problem with math, imo, is that people get lost early and start hating it and then they never get into it.

Having said that, I agree that teachers not being engaging is the problem and that it's not really the fault of the number system. But to the extent that any kind of system setup can make things easier for people at the start, it's the best we can do to mitigate bad teachers.

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

The more important question is, which factions of insane magical megalomaniacs are responsible for which mathematical thingy and associated support?

Also, Tau; At least I've mellowed to the point where I'd be happy to see them eaten, Ala the Squats, rather than retconned from existence.

I'm pretty much just going to keep repeating stealth suits and railguns until I get tired or you give in.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

The more important question is, which factions of insane magical megalomaniacs are responsible for which mathematical thingy and associated support?

Well, if not the Seers, then at least some nefarious group of mages has been at work on mathematics, to the eternal pain and misery of mathematicians everywhere.

Seriously, the notational confusion of logarithms is so stupid and widespread, it's like people are brainwashed to not see how awful they're making everything. People seem to delight in deliberately using different notations from everyone else every now and then. Like ... just to be different or something.

I have a textbook which, for no reason at all, decides that it's super cool to use a regular dot for multiplication instead of the middle dot (·), so a.b instead of a·b, so you end up getting stuff like 3.4 which might be a single number or a product of two numbers. You can't tell unless you look at the context.

And it also decides that it's really fun to write functions such as f(x) like xf instead, like you were multiplying x and f rather than taking f of x. I do know this leads to some minor simplifications later on, but it also leads to a lot of the opposite.

I totally gave up on that book after that.

Originally Posted by Anarion

See, I think going the other way makes more sense. The most simple and basic formula should look completely simple and early on people should be able to grasp the stuff as easily as possible. If you avoid scaring them off, then they'll actually learn the math and then by the time they get into trig they'll be capable enough to divide by 2 as necessary.

The problem with math, imo, is that people get lost early and start hating it and then they never get into it.

Having said that, I agree that teachers not being engaging is the problem and that it's not really the fault of the number system. But to the extent that any kind of system setup can make things easier for people at the start, it's the best we can do to mitigate bad teachers.

I agree clarity and not scaring away young people is super important, which is exactly why tau should be used instead.

My point is, by the time students get to the area of circles, division by 2 should absolutely not be a source of concern. If they are scared by circles because of a division by 2, then you have already failed them when you taught them division. Throwing out all the good that tau does because teachers fail at teaching division to kids is totally missing the problem.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Deadly

I agree clarity and not scaring away young people is super important, which is exactly why tau should be used instead.

My point is, by the time students get to the area of circles, division by 2 should absolutely not be a source of concern. If they are scared by circles because of a division by 2, then you have already failed them when you taught them division. Throwing out all the good that tau does because teachers fail at teaching division to kids is totally missing the problem.

Deadly, we're actually talking about two different things here. You're saying that people should be comfortable with fractions at the point when they're getting into circles. I agree with you that they should, and that Tau has several notational advantages.

However, I am making a statement about my belief as to the state of the world. I believe it is a fact that even though people should know fractions, many do not. And I believe it is a fact that many people become uncomfortable when they see an expression with the appearance of a fraction.

Because I believe those facts to be true, I think that the introduction of tau would be counterproductive and would make it harder for young people to catch up due to their discomfort. Thefore, I think Tau should only be introduced after or in concurrence with other efforts to improve mathematics teaching.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Anarion

Deadly, we're actually talking about two different things here. You're saying that people should be comfortable with fractions at the point when they're getting into circles. I agree with you that they should, and that Tau has several notational advantages.

However, I am making a statement about my belief as to the state of the world. I believe it is a fact that even though people should know fractions, many do not. And I believe it is a fact that many people become uncomfortable when they see an expression with the appearance of a fraction.

Because I believe those facts to be true, I think that the introduction of tau would be counterproductive and would make it harder for young people to catch up due to their discomfort. Thefore, I think Tau should only be introduced after or in concurrence with other efforts to improve mathematics teaching.

And I say I think it's wrong not to address the actual problem itself. Keeping pi for the sake of a single formula, so that you can avoid something so trivial as taking half of a value, is ... it just can't be justified, in my head.

Say you're a teacher, and you're teaching your students circles when you realize that some of them are scared off by that little fraction because of bad experiences or something. I don't dispute that this might be a common problem, but what do you do? Do you hide the fraction with a magic trick which is only going to be helpful for that one case and will cause lots of confusion later on, or do you do your best to help those students not fear that little fraction?

You could keep pi for that one instance and use tau everywhere else, but that's going to confuse people a lot too, I suspect.

And what about pi (and tau) itself? Pi is defined as a fraction, are you going to hide that and just give them a magic number without any kind of explanation? You could do that, either option might cause confusion, but isn't it better to present the definition and try to help them not fear it but to see the elegance of it all?

Trying to hide things that the students might fear will only hurt them and stop them from overcoming that fear. It will also make it harder to grasp future material, which will lead to further fears.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Deadly

1. So ... you want to confuse them a hundred times more when they get to radians and trigonometry and all the other stuff where tau really shines and makes everything so much neater? Wouldn't it be better to accept a tiny bit of possible confusion in one area to eliminate a much bigger and more pervasive confusion elsewhere?

2. Getting a good grip on division is something I'd say is important for kids at that age. If they are scared by having to halve something when they get to circles and areas, then their education has failed them massively! If we were talking about stranger fractions rather than simply halving stuff, then maybe. If squaring something is not scary, then division by 2 should not be.

If children are intimidated by simple fractions, it is not the fault of the fractions (or the children), but of their teachers, parents, educational system and/or society as a whole.

3. You could write it as 2A=tau * r^2 if you really wanted to avoid obvious fractions. Perhaps there's even an opportunity for some lesson or (possibly visual) aid to help them better understanding the formula or division itself. As a teacher I'd probably see an opportunity for some discussion here.

Some things.

First, I've never learned long division. I can't. No, seriously. I have the general idea, and I can do basic division in my head, or even break it into five different problems, count X units one at a time until they math up an drop the remainder into the next equation (which is ostensibly what long division is), but my brain cannot process long division. I had to relearn it every day after school for a year to get my homework done. I think it's a brain damage issue, honestly. Am I a bad guy because I find the concept of reding to divide a number into a fraction or huge decimal thingy tedious enough to just not bother?

Also, tau may be neat, but it's too elite. As a cashier, a roofer, a construction worker, a strategist, a lay-engineer, and when working out geometry for massage, pi has been simple enough to use. And none of those situations would call for tau. So, why bother teaching kids early on something they won't use, and that doesn't have an easy metric, so that if they bother getting to trigonometry (fat chance of that, since they can't even use the basics of geometry theyre getting so why bother with more stuff you don't get?) instead of reserving tau for people who need it. Kids Lear that Pi may as well be 3.14, teenagers learn that pi I'd actually a discrete number, an later, adults who go into the field can learn about tau.

Temperature is a state of a system base on energy and entropy, whee the higher the temperature, the more energy you feed into the system the more entropy you get. No one from age 0-17 will make heads or tails of that. They will understand hot and cold. So teach them hot an cold, and teach them the more rigorous science when they need it. Teach both! Don't throw the baby out with the bath water.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Some things.

First, I've never learned long division. I can't. No, seriously. I have the general idea, and I can do basic division in my head, or even break it into five different problems, count X units one at a time until they math up an drop the remainder into the next equation (which is ostensibly what long division is), but my brain cannot process long division. I had to relearn it every day after school for a year to get my homework done. I think it's a brain damage issue, honestly. Am I a bad guy because I find the concept of reding to divide a number into a fraction or huge decimal thingy tedious enough to just not bother?

I can't do long division either. I don't even remember ever learning division in school, which I will admit is more likely to be faulty memory but I seriously can not remember ever learning division. It's blank, it never happened as far as my memory is concerned.

I've never needed long division. We have calculators after all. You don't need to know long division to understand division, long division is for when you wish to do division of big numbers by hand, and how often do you need that in the modern age? It may also be useful in the study of some specialized areas of number theory, which I've recently found out, much to my horror.

The few times I've tried to understand long division, it has made absolutely no sense. I have no clue which hat they're pulling those numbers out of.

I've always found it funny how friends and family assume that because I study math, I'm somehow really good at numbers. I'm horrible at numbers, although I've gotten better over the years, slow and steady from constant use.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Also, tau may be neat, but it's too elite. As a cashier, a roofer, a construction worker, a strategist, a lay-engineer, and when working out geometry for massage, pi has been simple enough to use. And none of those situations would call for tau. So, why bother teaching kids early on something they won't use, and that doesn't have an easy metric, so that if they bother getting to trigonometry (fat chance of that, since they can't even use the basics of geometry theyre getting so why bother with more stuff you don't get?) instead of reserving tau for people who need it. Kids Lear that Pi may as well be 3.14, teenagers learn that pi I'd actually a discrete number, an later, adults who go into the field can learn about tau.

The problem is that pi is an awkward choice based on a strange convention. the problem goes to the very root of pi and affects everything.

Of course, the ones most directly affected will be those who go on to study science, engineering and other mathy subjects, but that doesn't mean others are unaffected.

It's a matter of concepts, not just the specific applications (like the area formula for circles). Tau uses a natural definition and leads to intuitive results, whereas pi is simply a strange convention that is only used because it's what we've always used. And you just deal with its strangeness because you're used to it, and it still works, sure.

You could just give students a list of formulas to memorize, in which case it doesn't matter a lick which constants, notations or definitions you use, because most of the students will never learn them anyway and those who do will do so only by rote memorization. You could also just teach them to use a calculator or a computer and be done a lot faster, but you'd be doing them a terrible disservice.

Ideally you want to teach children to understand what pi (or tau) means, why it is what it is and why they use it where they do. Not because knowing this will be directly useful for most of them, in itself, or because they're likely to remember it five years on, but because the conceptual understanding is important. It is important to teach children to understand and to question what they're doing and why they're doing it, even if they forget the specifics (like what pi is) later on. Then they'll learn other specifics that do matter to their particular job or interests.

Also, tau is not more complicated to use than pi in practical problems, it's just a slightly different number, so there's really no downside. Quite the opposite for a lot of situations.

Well, I suppose because of history there's the downside that a change will require people to remember a new number and all, but that's a problem which will diminish over time.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Eh. I never saw a problem with Pi, and despite having read up on this 2pi thing before, I just don't see the point. It strikes me very much as a case of better-cause-it's-new, created for the sake of having created it rather than to fill a genuine need. And the idea of a campaign to replace the historically used alternative with it, calling it wrong (despite being no less mathematically accurate), just seems very much like a thing

I'm thinking on reflection Tau is probably a Free Council wheeze. Pi doesn't feel convaluted or unhelpful enough to be any kind of Seer plot though, really.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

Eh. I never saw a problem with Pi, and despite having read up on this 2pi thing before, I just don't see the point. It strikes me very much as a case of better-cause-it's-new, created for the sake of having created it rather than to fill a genuine need. And the idea of a campaign to replace the historically used alternative with it, calling it wrong (despite being no less mathematically accurate), just seems very much like a thing

I'm thinking on reflection Tau is probably a Free Council wheeze. Pi doesn't feel convaluted or unhelpful enough to be any kind of Seer plot though, really.

Aside from the purely aesthetic appeal of it (which I will admit is probably not something most people will get), the actual need is a pedagogical one rather than a purely practical one. When you're just plugging in numbers it doesn't matter which numbers those are, as long as you know the result will come out right.

But tau is easier and more natural conceptually, which may help a lot of people who struggle with math because of pi. I certainly know I've had plenty of problems with pi. Most of my dislike of trigonometry is probably because of pi.

Edit: Also, I think it'd have to be a Seer plot exactly because it's subtle and something people just shrug off, like you're all doing right now

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

No, see, the real injustice is that pi/tau is such an ugly number in and of itself. My (Mage) solution is to just change the global curvature of space so that pi = 3. Then you don't even need a name for it!

This Machine Surrounds Hate And Forces It To Surrender

Originally Posted by Anarion

DD, your unicorn is stronger, prettier, and higher-ranking than mine, and her secret lab has a better name than mine. THERE SHALL BE NO QUARTER.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Deadly

But tau is easier and more natural conceptually, which may help a lot of people who struggle with math because of pi. I certainly know I've had plenty of problems with pi. Most of my dislike of trigonometry is probably because of pi.

Do you really think this will make a difference? It doesn't change most of the equations, it just removes a 2 from some places. Okay, now there are tau radians instead of 2pi, and the volume of a sphere is 2/3tau(r^3). But the 2 on 2pi tends to pop in and out during most physics equations, a lot of times it drops off. I had a physics teacher in college tell the whole class that if you're ever feeling like you did a problem right but the answer is off, just check for any combination of pi, 2, or 2pi and see if that fixes the problem.

For all that you've been saying that dividing by two isn't a huge deal when teaching kids, is multiplying by 2 really such a huge deal that we should overturn an entire industry convention and force people to rewrite new computer programs and algorithms because they're not supposed to draw on pi anymore?

Originally Posted by Thanqol

XCOM's a hell of a drug @_@

Seriously. Man, it was like 5:00 AM for me when I finished after we talked last night. Lack of sleep, my god.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Deadly

Aside from the purely aesthetic appeal of it (which I will admit is probably not something most people will get), the actual need is a pedagogical one rather than a purely practical one. When you're just plugging in numbers it doesn't matter which numbers those are, as long as you know the result will come out right.

But tau is easier and more natural conceptually, which may help a lot of people who struggle with math because of pi. I certainly know I've had plenty of problems with pi. Most of my dislike of trigonometry is probably because of pi.

Edit: Also, I think it'd have to be a Seer plot exactly because it's subtle and something people just shrug off, like you're all doing right now

But the discovery of Pi helped the sum total of human knowledge considerably. It's a useful tool, something that helps raise up mankind. (regardless of whether there's a tidier way of writing it), which is surely themeatically the opposite of what the Seers are about? Don't question the world, don't investigate it. Sit back, have a macdonalds and if you really need to work something out, you can always just use a calculator anyway.

As for changing the Global Curvature of Space to make Pi = 3...
I like it. It's neet, tidy and I can't see how it could possible backfire.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

I like it. It's neet, tidy and I can't see how it could possible backfire.

If you didn't change anything else, the universe would either implode on itself forever or would fly apart so fast that no matter would form. I'm not sure which, but one of the two. Either way, we wouldn't be around.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by the_druid_droid

No, see, the real injustice is that pi/tau is such an ugly number in and of itself. My (Mage) solution is to just change the global curvature of space so that pi = 3. Then you don't even need a name for it!

But who says it's such an ugly number? We don't know why pi/tau has the value it does, perhaps there is a mindblowingly beautiful reason and you're going to blow that up just to make it look superficially simple

And what would be the wider consequences of your plan? Changing pi to be exactly 3 will affect a LOT of fundamental stuff about the universe. A LOT!

And I am Pinkie'd, of course

Originally Posted by Thanqol

Neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerds.

And proud!

Originally Posted by Anarion

Do you really think this will make a difference? It doesn't change most of the equations, it just removes a 2 from some places. Okay, now there are tau radians instead of 2pi, and the volume of a sphere is 2/3tau(r^3). But the 2 on 2pi tends to pop in and out during most physics equations, a lot of times it drops off. I had a physics teacher in college tell the whole class that if you're ever feeling like you did a problem right but the answer is off, just check for any combination of pi, 2, or 2pi and see if that fixes the problem.

For all that you've been saying that dividing by two isn't a huge deal when teaching kids, is multiplying by 2 really such a huge deal that we should overturn an entire industry convention and force people to rewrite new computer programs and algorithms because they're not supposed to draw on pi anymore?.

Yes, I really do think it will make a HUGE difference, for the reasons I've tried to express above. Pi is screwing over a lot of students who would benefit from something so very simple as just replacing 2pi with tau, not for the practicality of it in particular but for the conceptual understanding.

Also a matter of truth and correctness, dammit! *angry fist shaking!*

And very little if any rewriting of programs would be needed. The computer doesn't care whether you call it 2pi or tau, it's the same exact number. Also the symbol tau was chosen exactly to avoid many such issues, because it's already an existing symbol.

Originally Posted by Tiki Snakes

But the discovery of Pi helped the sum total of human knowledge considerably. It's a useful tool, something that helps raise up mankind. (regardless of whether there's a tidier way of writing it), which is surely themeatically the opposite of what the Seers are about? Don't question the world, don't investigate it. Sit back, have a macdonalds and if you really need to work something out, you can always just use a calculator anyway.

Pi is screwing over millions of students worldwide, preventing them from grasping concepts that could lead them on to a path of enlightenment and understanding. If that is not a Seer plot, I don't know what is.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Anarion

If you didn't change anything else, the universe would either implode on itself forever or would fly apart so fast that no matter would form. I'm not sure which, but one of the two. Either way, we wouldn't be around.

Screw that, we're mages!

This Machine Surrounds Hate And Forces It To Surrender

Originally Posted by Anarion

DD, your unicorn is stronger, prettier, and higher-ranking than mine, and her secret lab has a better name than mine. THERE SHALL BE NO QUARTER.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Deadly

And very little if any rewriting of programs would be needed. The computer doesn't care whether you call it 2pi or tau, it's the same exact number. Also the symbol tau was chosen exactly to avoid many such issues, because it's already an existing symbol.

What about whenever a program tried to do anything with an older, existing program that had the same number defined as a different variable? Or if people went and grabbed existing code that already was using pi and tried to change or expand it, they'd have to go through and replace everything with tau, right?

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Anarion

What about whenever a program tried to do anything with an older, existing program that had the same number defined as a different variable? Or if people went and grabbed existing code that already was using pi and tried to change or expand it, they'd have to go through and replace everything with tau, right?

There might be some special cases, I can not rule that out. Mostly when you use someone else's code or interact with an existing program, it is through an interface of some sort. How their code works exactly shouldn't matter to you. If it uses pi somewhere, that's not going to affect you, you trust that their implementation is correct and it does what it advertises (of course you might want to check if you don't trust them, but that's another matter).

What you need to be aware of is what input it requires and what its output is expected to be. If it requires pi as input, then obviously you need to give it pi (or half tau), and if it spits out pi then obviously you shouldn't treat that as tau.

Also, I want to say that there's nothing wrong in using the value 3.14 (plus however many decimals you need) if that's what is most natural in a practical application. If you understand that 3.14 is half tau, and you happen to need half tau, then surely you write 3.14 not 6.28/2.

Heck, you can even call that pi if you like, as long as you understand tau and use that as the base definition. Start with tau, learn the math using tau, then do whatever you wish once you understand it.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Deadly

Pi is screwing over millions of students worldwide, preventing them from grasping concepts that could lead them on to a path of enlightenment and understanding. If that is not a Seer plot, I don't know what is.

I'm really just not sure it is though. (On either count, I guess.)

Originally Posted by Deadly

Heck, you can even call that pi if you like, as long as you understand tau and use that as the base definition. Start with tau, learn the math using tau, then do whatever you wish once you understand it.

Conversely, we already have a special term for 2pi. We call it...2pi.
*shrug*

Edit - FATE

Spoiler

Show

Playing (slowly) through Unlimited Blade Works.
To be honest, not finding it quite so good as Fate route. Still, as an alternate route it's interesting enough in it's own right.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by Deadly

I can't do long division either. I don't even remember ever learning division in school, which I will admit is more likely to be faulty memory but I seriously can not remember ever learning division. It's blank, it never happened as far as my memory is concerned.

I've never needed long division. We have calculators after all. You don't need to know long division to understand division, long division is for when you wish to do division of big numbers by hand, and how often do you need that in the modern age? It may also be useful in the study of some specialized areas of number theory, which I've recently found out, much to my horror.

Yeah, no we covered Long division in fifth, sixth and eight grade. By about advanced algebra I was really feeling the hurt.

You know they are trying to stop teaching basic arithmetic in schools, now? With the number of calculators, cellphones, smart phones and iPods and stuf out there, kids will always be able tow chess a calculator. Who area if they know how it works? And that kills me every day. You know why?

Because there's a difference between profit and profit margin. If you have an item you buy for $1, and you sell it for $2, that's a 100% increase but you're only making 50% profit. If you increase something by 25% then the old number is only 80% of the new number. An these are basic principles that his won't come through anymore because kids will always have a calculator, right?

They just won't know how, why or when to use them. And every time my manager confuses mark up and profit margin, I get in trouble for not correcting him. An I get in trouble for correcting him. Math, small basic math is an integral part of my everyday life. I've needed long division plenty.

The problem is that pi is an awkward choice based on a strange convention. the problem goes to the very root of pi and affects everything.

Originally Posted by Deadly

Yes, I really do think it will make a HUGE difference, for the reasons I've tried to express above. Pi is screwing over a lot of students who would benefit from something so very simple as just replacing 2pi with tau, not for the practicality of it in particular but for the conceptual understanding.

Also a matter of truth and correctness, dammit! *angry fist shaking!*

No it's not, no its not, and no it's not.
Pisis the lie around the circle divided by the line across the circle. That is a fundamentally simple and intuitive thing; for every unit you increase the width of a circle, you increase it's circumference by [pi] units. Kids in my class were getting this before they even understood what a circumference was, an it took a good two more weeks before the smart kids could keep radius and diameter separate. It's one of those memories I still clearly possess because of the emotion involved. I slipped up on the measurement and calmly declared the result of such division to be 3.16, and the subtle shame has stuck with me ever since.

You may like tau, but it is neither more correct, nor more right, nor more elegant. It is strictly lateral. I am all in favor of promoting both, but creating a false binary where it must be one or the other falls under No-No practices for me. Smart people will know tau and pi. Dumb people won't know either. Changing smart people to only know tau because they already only know pi is not and cannot be an improvement.

Originally Posted by the_druid_droid

No, see, the real injustice is that pi/tau is such an ugly number in and of itself. My (Mage) solution is to just change the global curvature of space so that pi = 3. Then you don't even need a name for it!

there is that, yes. Though it's only ugly if you force it into base10 needlessly. It's like that point-nine-infinity equals one debacle. It doesn't equal one. It equals you're using the wrong system.

And very little if any rewriting of programs would be needed. The computer doesn't care whether you call it 2pi or tau, it's the same exact number. Also the symbol tau was chosen exactly to avoid many such issues, because it's already an existing symbol.

Computer code the world over would need to be rewritten. It would bankrupt the world; theoretically why the US doesn't use metric.

Pi is screwing over millions of students worldwide, preventing them from grasping concepts that could lead them on to a path of enlightenment and understanding. If that is not a Seer plot, I don't know what is.

Tau is creatin a false dichotomy through swaying loyalty of aesthetics to promote infighting amongst the sleeper elite; mathematicians the world over feud, and progress halts. That is a seer plot.

Then again, both eating and not eating is a seer plot. the game line Mage: the awakening could be a seer plot. It's weird.

Thanqol, would you say using forces 2 to bypass a magnetic lock is covert or vulgar? The vulgar version involves removing electricity from wired into objects. The covert version involves triggering a signal in the lok you can't know about. Rotes aren't being helpful.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Computer code the world over would need to be rewritten. It would bankrupt the world; theoretically why the US doesn't use metric.

Mmm, I'm going to have to agree with Deadly on this one as an erstwhile programmer. It strongly depends on what your input/output is. Also, backward compatibility is always a thing and people manage to deal with it despite having things much more complex than a constant change.

This Machine Surrounds Hate And Forces It To Surrender

Originally Posted by Anarion

DD, your unicorn is stronger, prettier, and higher-ranking than mine, and her secret lab has a better name than mine. THERE SHALL BE NO QUARTER.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by the_druid_droid

Mmm, I'm going to have to agree with Deadly on this one as an erstwhile programmer. It strongly depends on what your input/output is. Also, backward compatibility is always a thing and people manage to deal with it despite having things much more complex than a constant change.

I thought we were talking about some hypothetical where pi wa not allowed, and everything had to use tau? I'd it's a simple as making a buffer program to convert, then yeah.

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by the_druid_droid

Mmm, I'm going to have to agree with Deadly on this one as an erstwhile programmer. It strongly depends on what your input/output is. Also, backward compatibility is always a thing and people manage to deal with it despite having things much more complex than a constant change.

Just so we're clear, my programming argument was not the doom scenario SiuiS brought up. I just think it's the kind of thing someone could easily overlook and then spend a couple hours rooting around before going "oh wait, defined the wrong constant, duh." And taking humanity as a collective, that would create an overall efficiency loss that would need to be justified elsewhere if you want to switch to Tau.

Edit: All this talk of tau and pi, but uh, back to the game. What are we doing now? Do we need to do anything else at this location, or can we head back to the base, get some mana back in whatever assorted methods, and hit up the library to figure out what's going on? Also, did Jack want to head back to find out what's become of that nameless crack addict, and would that be before or after we replenish mana?

Re: Skyscraper Graveyard II: Jealousy and Ambition

Originally Posted by the_druid_droid

Mmm, I'm going to have to agree with Deadly on this one

Hoh boy! I think you just blew up the universe, man!

Sometimes I think I could argue that it's not OK to beat up old ladies, and everyone would still push and shove to get first in line to argue that we should totally go beat up all the old ladies for lulz. Is there some kind of lets-argue-with-Deadly conspiracy? Do you do it on purpose?

Alright, alright, I'm joking But seriously, doesn't anyone ever agree with me on any of my major points?

The only argument I can see for dismissing tau is the status quo, that we don't want to bother about something new because it's not big enough to worry about, that it's not significant enough, and that's not a good argument. That's the kind of argument that leaves everything stagnant and prevents progress.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Yeah, no we covered Long division in fifth, sixth and eight grade. By about advanced algebra I was really feeling the hurt.

You know they are trying to stop teaching basic arithmetic in schools, now? With the number of calculators, cellphones, smart phones and iPods and stuf out there, kids will always be able tow chess a calculator. Who area if they know how it works? And that kills me every day. You know why?

Because there's a difference between profit and profit margin. If you have an item you buy for $1, and you sell it for $2, that's a 100% increase but you're only making 50% profit. If you increase something by 25% then the old number is only 80% of the new number. An these are basic principles that his won't come through anymore because kids will always have a calculator, right?

They just won't know how, why or when to use them. And every time my manager confuses mark up and profit margin, I get in trouble for not correcting him. An I get in trouble for correcting him. Math, small basic math is an integral part of my everyday life. I've needed long division plenty.

I totally agree with you, except that I think you're thinking of something more than me when you say long division.

When I speak of long division specifically, I think of a particular algorithm used to calculate one number divided by another and nothing more (it is not the only such algorithm, by the way). I do not talk about division itself, or about fractions, and certainly not percentages, all of which I will agree are immensely important for kids to have a good relationship with, for the reasons you outlined.

I do not have the experience or knowledge to say whether long division is helpful or hurtful for some students in some areas, or whether some other division algorithm might be better to teach. Maybe it helps, maybe it's good practice, there are plenty of ways I can see that long division might be an aid. There are also ways in which I can see it might be hurtful and put students off division, where perhaps a different algorithm could help them. This is an area where I think the teacher's own wisdom and judgment ought to be applied, in each individual case. Sadly that's somewhat utopian, of course, but I am an idealist.

What I believe is that if a kid doesn't know long division (the particular algorithm), it is not the end of the world for them and will probably not impair their ability to understand division, fractions, percentages, algebra or anything else except maybe certain topics in number theory.

That doesn't mean long division can't be an aid or a good thing to teach, and it most certainly does not mean we should not teach kids division, fractions and all the other good things.

I hope that sets my position straight.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

No it's not, no its not, and no it's not.
Pisis the lie around the circle divided by the line across the circle. That is a fundamentally simple and intuitive thing; for every unit you increase the width of a circle, you increase it's circumference by [pi] units. Kids in my class were getting this before they even understood what a circumference was, an it took a good two more weeks before the smart kids could keep radius and diameter separate. It's one of those memories I still clearly possess because of the emotion involved. I slipped up on the measurement and calmly declared the result of such division to be 3.16, and the subtle shame has stuck with me ever since.

You may like tau, but it is neither more correct, nor more right, nor more elegant. It is strictly lateral. I am all in favor of promoting both, but creating a false binary where it must be one or the other falls under No-No practices for me. Smart people will know tau and pi. Dumb people won't know either. Changing smart people to only know tau because they already only know pi is not and cannot be an improvement.

Did you look at the manifesto I linked earlier? Pi is absolutely not in any way just as correct or elegant as tau.

A teacher could simply draw a circle and say "this is a circle, it is this long around, it is this wide, now calculate!" No doubt that's how it goes often enough, and kids are familiar enough with the intuitive, common-sense notion of a circle as something round that they probably won't struggle with that.

But what if you draw an ellipse and ask, is this a circle? They may eagerly raise their hands and answer yes (or maybe they will be smart and say no), and then you'll have to say, no this is an ellipse because it's kinda less round. And sure, they'll get that too and not even blink.

But a circle is not defined as "something round that is not slightly squeezed, because then it's an ellipse". If you just want to teach kids raw calculation, as in fact is what is taught most of the time, then it's fine to just leave them with their every-day idea of what a circle is.

A circle is defined as a distance from a point, everything that lies exactly that distance from that point. It would be awkward to define a circle by its diameter, and would probably involve a sneaky radius anyway, no matter how you twist it. By the definition of a circle it is certainly more natural to use the distance from the center rather than arbitrarily doubling it when you wish to define the circle constant. And that gives you tau.

Teach kids what a circle is, not just how it looks. Save the diameter for later, because the diameter is a derived feature from the definition. That's math rather than calculation.

If you didn't have a problem with pi, I can not imagine you would have had a problem with tau either, had history looked different. But someone who struggles with pi (especially later on) may benefit tremendously from switching to tau instead, and it would be even better if they didn't have to make that switch (until they're comfortable enough with it). Therefore, start with tau!

Originally Posted by SiuiS

Tau is creatin a false dichotomy through swaying loyalty of aesthetics to promote infighting amongst the sleeper elite; mathematicians the world over feud, and progress halts. That is a seer plot.

You are wrong that it halts progress, exactly the opposite. It incites debate and study, it causes us to look deeper at the math, to try to understand it better or in a different way. That is progress.

Originally Posted by SiuiS

I thought we were talking about some hypothetical where pi wa not allowed, and everything had to use tau? I'd it's a simple as making a buffer program to convert, then yeah.

No, I thought I made that clear in my last post, but I'll try again.

I have never argued that we should throw out pi and never, ever use it. I've never argued that you can't use the number/symbol/name pi if you wish.

What I argue is that tau has an educational, academic, aesthetic and logical value and should replace pi as the base definition of the circle constant for both clarity and correctness.

I do not care if an engineer uses pi in their calculations, or a programmer has a constant called pi in their code, or someone memorizes a thousand digits of pi for fun. But when you teach circles and radians and other related subjects, tau ought to be the base definition from which you proceed, unless you're making a point or has some other reason to use pi in a particular example.

And there are plenty of reasons you might do that, because pi is still interesting because of how it relates to tau. I leave you with a quote from the manifesto I linked earlier, because I felt it put it well:

Finally, we can embrace the situation as a teaching opportunity: the idea that pi might be wrong is interesting, and students can engage with the material by converting the equations in their textbooks from pi to tau to see for themselves which choice is better.

A lot of people think math is this sort of fixed, unchanging monument, a list of formulas to learn by rote or apply to the same old kinds of problems, that nothing new ever happens. That could not be further from the truth. A change from pi to tau could be an opportunity to teach not just the math, but also the history of math and how math is a subject in constant change where you can still discover new or better ways to do things. That would be a very positive thing to teach kids.